


Loyalty.Royalty

by michaeyusone



Category: TWICE (Band)
Genre: Alternate History, Alternate Universe - Royalty, F/F, First Love, Pre-Poly, Princesses, Thief, inspired by the handmaiden
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-28
Updated: 2020-07-28
Packaged: 2021-03-04 18:40:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 19,487
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25431022
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/michaeyusone/pseuds/michaeyusone
Summary: “You wear your heart upon your sleeve so watch out for pickpockets.”Sana’s father, the king of the nation dies. With no male heirs (except his incompetent brother), the next viable option for the throne is Duke Myoui who uproots his life from another land with his wife and daughter. The two royal daughters, Sana and Mina, aren’t supposed to meet or speak but they do anyway. A skilled thief with a kind heart manages to steal what both girls cherish the most with no regrets
Relationships: Im Nayeon/Minatozaki Sana, Im Nayeon/Myoui Mina, Minatozaki Sana/Myoui Mina
Comments: 5
Kudos: 50
Collections: Shot Thru the Heart: A Writing Collection





	1. PART ONE: CHILDHOOD

Childhood

Things were complicated when I think back on the period of my life we call ‘childhood.’ But in comparison to hers, I had no troubles. My father was given the title of Duke before my birth. He and my mother were the Duke and Duchess of Narita; my grandfather was the king of our entire kingdom, Kikya. Our kingdom and control spanned a little over a quarter of the world, but we weren’t even the greatest of the four families. That title would have been awarded to the Minatozakis. They controlled lands big and small. Countries, islands, the largest continent. Their names were always treated as the ‘most important’ royal if you were to ask any of our populations. King Minatozaki knew how to rule and how to negotiate lands and territories with the other three families to avoid war. He was brilliant in political life; not so much in family life. He only held contempt for his one daughter. I hadn’t met her yet. I was ignorant to the ways she would change my life. 

Back home, we were one of the few who were driven around in cars. Our palaces were outfitted with high-class paintings and sculptures. We had land for hunting, we had lakes, we had rivers, I even had a personal pond in the garden that was filled with ducklings in the spring. I would wake up to a tray of food near the foot of my bed and my handmaiden would bathe me and get me dressed every morning. I could do anything then. My father didn’t have as many responsibilities and my mother would take us sailing on the river when the wind blew its soft breezes. But then King Minatozaki fell ill. His male heirs had all mysteriously died or moved to another country outside his kingdom rule. When he passed, the family council didn’t have a plan for who would inherit his lands and especially not his governing status. 

At that time, I had no true knowledge of politics. People treated me as royalty, so who was I to question such a positive attribute as that. I couldn’t have even met double digits in birthdays when we were transported to a foreign land. I didn’t question it. It wasn’t the place for a nine-year-old to do so anyway. 

Minatozaki and my father were distant acquaintances. On the king’s deathbed, he recommended him to take the title of king and rule his lands. My father was appointed regent for years while the council came to a better solution to keep the four families intact. The four families – presently three – wanted to avoid fighting over the throne as much as possible. They avoided war at all costs. But there was also the task of making sure one family didn’t gain too much power. And what I learned later in life; land was power.

All I remember was the faint smell of salt wafting over my nose highlighted by the rocky uncertainty of the waves under the ferry. My mother’s head was leaned over the side of the boat. Her pale color found a way to naturally lighten itself much better than those cremes she forced our handmaidens to apply before bed. She was suggested to use extreme caution with those and to only apply on special occasions. She never listened. 

My father was shrieking in anger about something or another. First at my mother then other passengers then a few crew members he thought were doing an inadequate job. He probably would have yelled at the captain if he had the chance. This was a constant in my life, believe it or not. I knew the exact way the vein in his forehead protruded and the level of anger associated with it. It wasn’t him or my mother that made me feel uneasy. It was the land the boat mounted itself against as our luggage was unloaded. 

This was the first time I felt conscious. Out of control. Unpredictable.

It wouldn’t be the last. 

We rode in a car for hours it felt like. I wasn’t sure. The unpaved dirt trails beneath us were comparable to the rocky sea waves and my mother’s color hadn’t returned to her face just yet. My eyes continued opening and closing on their own. My brain was tired. My eyelids even more so. I tried rubbing the discomfort away. The parents didn’t like that. They spoke as if I was purposely damaging my eyesight. “Trying to garner sympathy and attention as always,” my mother muttered. I didn’t understand her. I never would. 

“Mina,” my father grouchily mumbled when we had arrived. Our belongings had already been taken inside the house that stood before me. It was dark and my heart sunk at the parts of the house I was able to see. It was small. Smaller than my grandparent’s castle, smaller than our palace back home, it was even smaller than a house we called our niwa cottage. 

The fencing around the front was a harsh concrete but the designs were intricate. That was all I saw as I was ushered closer to the front doors by my father. 

My mother found herself judging the faces of the servants. They had arrived much earlier than us, but this was their homeland either way. Most of them were more than likely born here than any other kingdom. Moving to different empires was an expensive hassle and pointless as they were all ruled the same. I was sure some of them wouldn’t like us. We were the outsiders taking up their space. But that didn’t matter to my parents as they were below us. 

Only one of the servants were recognized by both my mother and I. My father had no recollection of any. She was in charge of the others it seemed. She wore a ring of keys dangling from her grey frock. Too many keys for me to count at that age. I remembered her name as Mrs. Goto, but I never called her that. I had no use to speak to her. She had the servants stand in a sharp line. They never spoke a word. They did, however, curtsey and bow as my mother made her way passing in front of them. Their eyes were directed at our feet. I always thought it strange that they treated us like that; as if we created the land that they walked on.

“This one won’t do,” my mother stated as if it was obvious. He was a small boy. He seemed brittle as if a wind would blow him away and float him into the sky similar to a leaf in the fall. My mother gave no reasoning. She didn’t need to. He wasn’t seen again after that day. 

We were walked inside our house by a tidy man in a tailored suit. To an average person, he looked polished. To my parents, he looked poor. His suit had been washed too many times that its color was fading, and his shoes weren’t nearly as clean as they would have liked. His white gloves were his only detail that was different from the others. I was led to my room first. My parents found their separate master bedrooms afterward. 

A teenage girl of about sixteen bowed at the waist when I entered. She would be my handmaiden. A fire was lit in the small corner of my room. She helped me undress, taking longer than the servants I was used to. The bed was uncomfortable and cold. I snarled at the girl. She quickly did her best to warm the bed until I excused her away. She bowed once again and left for her own bedroom. Where it was? I had no idea and wasn’t planning on learning. 

The next day, I woke early to explore. We had come after the sun had gone down, so I knew nothing of what the outside or inside of my house looked like. My breakfast was already prepared and set clear to the side of my bed in front of my fireplace. My handmaiden was sitting on her knees atop a tatami mat. Once she was aware that I was awake, she stood with a start and motioned toward the food, “Breakfast is ready, Your Grace.” She moved a pillow onto the mat for me to sit and moved away to give me peace. “It’s Mina. You don’t have to say, ‘your grace.’” The handmaiden bowed and blushed knowing she could never call me by my first name. She tried leaving the room when I sat before the fire, “I’ll be outside the door when you’re ready, ma’am-” She was fighting the temptation to say words referencing my title and her mouth would never be able to utter my real name. She scampered away like a roach scattered at the sight of a candlelight in the dim night. I was used to eating alone but I had no appetite. The spoon dived in the bowl of rice. My chopsticks picked up one piece of meat, laid it atop the rice, then scooped the combination into my mouth. I did this once again before deserting the meal. I didn’t even touch the various vegetables that were provided; all freshly picked and washed. I offered the rest of my meal to my servant once outside my door. She had areas of patches in her dress which she tried hiding. “No thank you,” she responded while staring at the floorboards.

Someone would be sent to collect the food in our absence. I wanted to know what the house looked like and the land surrounding it. My handmaiden followed behind. Not too closely. I still didn’t know her name. Once outside in the open air, we walked with her slightly behind me. My head turned in her direction as I halted to rest. She did the same, but her eyes hit the ground as she stared at her shoes. I took one step. She followed. “What is your name?” She momentarily stared me in the eyes, but her head diverted back to the floor. Does she not like me? I had wondered. There was never a clear answer. I didn’t try again.

My feet were planted in place as I stared at the uninteresting architecture before me; noting that the house was much smaller than I had realized the night prior. A gardener was tidying some tiles leading to the back garden. I followed him and behind me was my handmaiden. Even the backyard at our old home was more exciting. But there were daisies here. Loads of daisies. Those made me smile. 

I picked one and handed it to my unnamed handmaiden with kindness. She refused it. I gave up the day’s adventure. At least at home, the maids and servants would talk to me or accept my childish gifts. My cousins were always a carriage ride away or running on the land. But here, there were only maids who stared at the ground. And no one to utter my name. My real name. My name that wasn’t attached to my family. 

I would start school soon I supposed. I wouldn’t be going anywhere; it would be a tutor. But it was something. 

The tutor was an elderly woman who had a kind face. Her face was deceiving to everyone except me. In front of my parents, she was a joy, but when the doors closed, I was lucky to not have her lay her hands on me. She tended to express I was too stupid to learn before her hand connected with my face. I came to the conclusion that she was just a bad teacher. So, when she began to get angry each time we met, I would slip out of my window and scale down the wall. This sounds adventurous but it was far from it. Going down, I had a ledge to rest my feet on, the uneven bricks and flowing vines gave me areas to place my hands. Sneaking back in the house was the challenge. I didn’t like challenges at that age, so I stopped trying after the third or fourth climb attempt. I would stay out until I knew that horrid lady was gone and snuck back in confidently. 

My parents weren’t around enough to notice, and the servants surely weren’t going to say anything. My handmaiden was scolded when I did this because she wasn’t able to find me. My tutor treated her worse, I’m confident of that, but I would selfishly rather her be hit than me. 

When I escaped, the time was spent discovering corners and trees and scenery in the backyard or beyond. It was lonely for a time. There was me, my daisies, the rush of the river nearby, the meadows where the grass hit up to my knees, the trees I learned to climb. There was no one else. I walked what seemed like hours until the green grass turned to brown. Still, there was no one. But one day, I heard the faint sounds of a woman repeating the same phrase over and over. On my tiptoes, I tried to get a glimpse of my possible neighbors. The hedges were slightly too tall but jumping let me see roughly who they were. 

A small child who was slightly taller than me stood next to a woman with dark hair and even darker sunken eyes. I gave a warm smile but received nothing in return. “Princess Myoui Mina, a pleasure to meet you.” I was still on my toes and my calves began to tremble in agony. The woman grabbed a tight hold of the girl near her, repeated her mumbling, and left without so much of a glance in my direction. The child turned her head fully and waved in my direction. “Sana, that’s enough of that,” the mumbling women chided.

I had learned her name. It didn’t mean much. I had learned too many names over the past weeks. Her name was supposed to stick in my brain. I repeated it over and over on my long journey back home, but my memory was too bad. One thing I didn’t forget was her jolly face as she had turned around. She looked like she wanted to jump over the greenery just to shout and laugh like kids were supposed to. Each time I managed to sneak out, I tried my best to find her. She didn’t seem to be outside when I was. 

“Is that the king’s daughter?” I had asked on one of the rare days that my father and mother were able to eat with me. They were never home especially my father who was stressed with the weight of the empire on his shoulders. My father waited until he swallowed his food completely and put down his chopsticks with a serious face. I pointed in the direction where I saw her the first time, “Is her name Sana? She seems to be around my age.” 

My father’s vein popped out, but it wasn’t that bad. I’d rate it a level 3 on the anger scale. “I don’t want you talking to the people of that house, Mina. Everyone in that place is mad. Absolutely mad. The king had a terrible encounter each time he returned home to see his daughter. I’m shocked he was willing to leave her with his siblings. But she was not a male heir. He didn’t see her as anything special.” I didn’t know if he said the king didn’t see Sana as anything special because that was how he saw me; his only heir. I didn’t get the chance to ask. I wouldn’t have asked even if he hadn’t been rushed away by his private secretary. 

I guessed I had seen a glimpse of their ‘crazy’ when the woman was murmuring to herself, but Sana seemed perfectly fine. 

I was picking daisies somewhat close to the back of my house and looping them to make bracelets and flower crowns. I heard a twig snap and turned my attention to the tall hedges. Nothing was there. I went back to my crowns. Another snap and the hedges shook violently. I stared in that direction until I saw a head pop from behind and disappear in a flash. Then again and again. Snap, shake, a smiling face. Snap, shake, a smiling face.

I stood near the bush waiting for the head to pop up again. “Mina!” She remembered my name, but my brain was foggy with hers. She jumped again and held onto the bush to try and stay suspended in the air for longer. It rattled violently before her feet slammed against the ground again. “What was your name again?” I asked ashamed at not remembering the detail. “Sana, of course. Daughter of the late King Minatozaki. Princess Minatozaki Sana, a pleasure to meet you.” 

I jumped along with her, bouncing on twigs and branches on my own side of the lawn. “I’m not supposed to talk to you. My uncle said your dad had mine killed,” Sana said it but continued jumping to glance at me. I waited for her feet to meet the grassy ground and jumped exactly when she did, “I’m not allowed to talk to you either. You’re mad.” 

Sana flaunted a bright smile, “I’m not mad. See?” Her smile grew as wide as possible until she really did look crazy. “I’m just happy,” she said. I matched her smile, but mine wasn’t as wide. “What are you doing over there with the flowers?” I turned back to my pile of picked daisies and handmade bracelets. I pointed on top of my head to the daisy crown I had made less than ten minutes before. “A crown,” I told her.

She had stopped jumping but didn’t walk away. “My dad had a crown. Is it like that?” I didn’t answer. Instead, I ran to pick up one of them I had made. I reached across the hedge and Sana reached back. She inspected it for a second before placing it on her head. “We’re matching. We have to be friends now,” she declared. I agreed. “How do I look?” she asked with sparkly eyes. Her new fashion accessory made her look even younger. She walked in a circle with her head focused on a point far off then gave a dramatic turn of her head back in my direction. I let out a fit of laughter when the very crown she was modeling flung onto the ground near her feet. 

“Mine looks better,” I told her. They both looked decent. Hers was better. “It does, gimme.” Sana reached over the bush to accept the circular flowers that were on my head. “No. I made them.” Sana grew angry and started throwing a tantrum in the middle of her garden. I stared at her blankly and waited for her to settle down. “YOU AREN’T MY FRIEND ANYMORE,” Sana furiously spoke it and trudged up the long hill back in the direction of her home, I assumed. At that time, I fully believed my dad. If she were that strange, just imagine the rest of her family.

The next time we met, weeks had passed. My handmaiden tried every day to coax me back inside with my tutor for her own benefit. Also, mine if you think about the value of my ‘learning.’ I ignored her and focused on the sewing needle in my hand instead. I didn’t get far with crocheting that day. I continuously pricked myself and getting the thread through the needle was its own harsh task. The bushes shook once again. But this time there was no jumping Sana or the sound of twigs snapping. There was a small face that appeared in a missing area of foliage. Her smile showed me she had forgiven me for not surrendering my flower crown. “Mina!” There it was once again – a friendly person was using my real name and not some meaningless title. I couldn’t blame my servants; it was a rule not to call royalty by their forenames. It was informal, disrespectful, and illegal depending on the royal you were addressing. The rule made me feel isolated, not special or honorable.

The woman who was with her the first time we met was staring at a brown leaf far from where we stood. I had to squint partially to see her with the sun in my eyes. She swayed back and forth on her toes, but I didn’t say anything to Sana about it. “Wait here,” Sana told me as she rushed towards her house once again. While she was gone, my attention didn’t leave the strange woman who now seemed to be humming and walking closer and closer to a river at the far end of Sana’s property. A large wisteria tree created shade on the other side of the bank. She stared at it and hummed louder. When her feet were nearing too close to the edge, she stopped and sat herself on the ground. The rushing water was always calming to my ears; I guessed that was why she did it. 

Sana came back with a brown stepping stool and put it against the hedges on her side. She daringly climbed the steps and vaulted herself across to my yard. Her jump wasn’t as big as she calculated and one of her legs caught inside the bush. I helped her as best I could to get her free. When we were both on the same side, she waited. I stood staring like she was a mirror. She fussed when she didn’t see me curtsy or even bow to her. “I am the princess. Why aren’t you curtseying like everyone else has to.” I stared at her blankly. “I am a princess. My father is regent, which is basically king, so you should curtsey to me.” Sana shook her head dramatically. “You don’t have royal blood. Your dad can’t be king.” I had the desire to push her on the ground for telling lies. “We do too have royal blood. Better than yours. We come from the first family - Myoui. Your lineage comes from the fourth.” Sana stuck out her tongue, “Then why isn’t your dad king?” I didn’t have an answer. It didn’t make sense to me why he wasn’t king back in Kikya. Later I learned that he was the youngest son of six and would never be able to rule, also, my grandfather was still alive and well.

Sana changed the subject by slapping my arm and saying I was a servant before running away from me. I stood silent. “I’m the queen. You have to touch me and then I’ll be a servant like you.” I still didn’t move. Sana toddled back somewhat disappointed, “You have to chase me, Mina.” When she was close enough, I reached out to touch her shoulder and rushed away. “I got you! I’m the queen now!” She pouted and claimed it wasn’t fair but chased after me anyway. We ran back and forth like that until we heard the faint calling of the lady near the river. Sana said she was her aunt. She made me hold her up as best I could so she could jump back over to the other side. 

Over the next days, I asked for two pairs of scissors from the head cook. I went to work cutting at the branches and leaves at a deep corner of my yard. My handmaiden did most of the work but that’s neither here nor there. I tried offering her to go inside to get water repeatedly. She would shake her head, “No, ma’am. The quicker we get this done, the quicker we get out of the sun.” I shrugged and had one of the kitchen boys bring me ice water and drank it down in the shade of a tree. Eventually, there was a small arch in the bush; one that was undetectable unless you knew it was there. I was ready to see Sana’s excitement whenever she returned. 

“Mina!” I heard her voice but couldn’t find where she was. Her head popped above the bushes from a single jump. “Sana,” I responded back a little less excited. “Princess Sana!” she countered before I told her about the gap in the hedges. 

We sat under a tree on my estate once Sana found the opening that had been shaped out. “I hate my uncle,” Sana sighed out, “but you can’t tell anyone, okay?” I had nodded but didn’t know why it mattered. I hated a few of my uncles. “Can we be friends forever?” she had asked while we drew hearts and stick people in the dirt. I told her we already were. But she took the question seriously. “Promise me,” she held up her pinky finger and waited for mine to meet hers. Our hands clasped each others until both our pinkies and thumbs met. Sana told me it was stamped, and the contract could never end. 

“It’s a heart,” Sana commented as she didn’t move her hand and neither did I. “No, it isn’t,” I told her, not seeing it. “Yeah-huh. An upside-down heart.” We both twisted our heads and bodies so we could see the image of the hand heart better. “If you break this promise, you break my heart.” She told me before she left, and I thought it was a joke. My nine-year-old self probably should have taken it more seriously. 

We met a few more times when Sana could get away. Her aunt would accompany her each time but leave us be when we were together. Then her aunt went back to staring at the river for hours. It was never anything to me as long as I was allowed to spend time with Sana.

I saw Sana once more that I feel inclined to mention. The final time I saw her during my childhood. The final time before she officially broke my heart and I broke hers. It’s human nature to wonder what happened between us, unfortunately, I’m not ready to travel down that road yet. A crossroads that would have kept us apart.

The last meeting was a sweet time despite what I have forewarned. The breeze caressed my cheeks and Sana had been sleeping under one of the trees in my yard until I arrived. I pulled a leaf from a branch and laid it upon her nose. She swatted it away. I repeated the actions before her eyes opened wide. “Mina! My aunt wants to boat on the river, but I told her I wouldn’t go without you.” She grabbed my hand and led us away from the land I was familiar with and towards her own. 

Her aunt was sitting as she frequently did on the riverbank. A man with a dark hat waited in a small wooden boat with his hand on a paddle. Without introducing myself properly, I was forced on the boat followed by Sana then her aunt. The woman I deemed crazy was worse than I imagined. I ignored her mutterings and loud humming to only focus on my friend beside me. She stared at the sky the whole journey. I followed her and did exactly as she did. “One day we’ll be arranged to marry, and we’ll be forced to live with that person forever.” I had never thought about marriage too much. Sana clutched my hand with hers still staring at the sky, “I think since we’re both royalty, I should like to marry you, Mina.” My eyebrows scrunched together in deep thought, “But what if we have to marry someone else?” Sana took off one of the daisy bracelets I had made her and wrapped it once, twice, thrice around the finger nearest my pinky. She put her lips against my cheek. “Then we’ll find a way. From today on, you’re my wife and if anyone tries to marry you, you’ll have to say you’re already married.” I approved of her proposal and our marriage.

When the boat ride was over, she put her lips to my cheek again. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Duchess Myoui of Loveavail.” She self-appointed me the title of duchess since I had been wed. She chose, I suspect, a random town in her empire for us to have ownership of. The two duchesses of Loveavail.

I had no idea it would be the last time I would see her. For several years, I went to the tree she had used to relax under or the gap in the bushes and hoped she would appear while screaming my name over the hedges, “Mina!” Her bright voice never showed. We were still friends for life that was for certain. And of course, she was still my wife. Distance wouldn’t change our vocal matrimonial contract.

When I could no longer call to Sana to hear her come running, the scenery surrounding my house became boring. It wasn’t as bright and colorful without her. So, I started venturing into a small nearby town. It was an hour walk and my feet would hurt the first few times I attempted the journey. I strolled the streets alone save for the occasional horse-drawn carriages that passed by. Or the one time, my father and his driver rode along the road in his car. I threw myself in some bushes when I heard the murmur of his car engine. I was never caught, yet it wasn’t fun picking out all the branches and leaves from my hair and dress. That was when I wished I had Sana with me the most or at least my handmaiden. Any friend or worker would have made the trip easier. But I wasn’t on good terms with my handmaiden and Sana was nowhere to be found.


	2. PART TWO: Adolescence

Adolescence

I was born with the name Im Nayeon. I was already fatherless from my first labored cry in this world and motherless when the time arrived for me to wean from her milk. I’m told I wasn’t thought to survive my first night. My body so frail and delicate the first night that my own mother questioned the amount of time she had been pregnant. My mother was a common thief, but she was one of the best. The moves she made were always daring and always paid more than other activities her criminal peers were up to. Her first job after giving birth to me was also supposed to be her last. I was told the story of how she went out with her crew during the night and she was one of the few that didn’t make it back. Even though I was much too young to remember, the Lees told me how the house was dark and joyless for weeks. During those weeks, thieves and criminals came to pay their respects and condolences. Most of them knew my mother from her heists and her skills and were devastated when she didn’t return. I wanted to be like her. I wanted to be better than her if it was possible.

As everyone she met loved my mother, she was understandably adored by the Lee family. The Lees were a plain-faced couple, Mr. Lee tall and lean and Mrs. Lee slightly statuesque; the men seemed to honor her figure. The Lees had never married as they spoke of it being too expensive but that didn’t keep Mrs. Lee from doting his name as a trophy. Their love was something I admired. They didn’t care too much for what outsiders thought of them. The Lee household was where I was to stay and age since my family tree had withered. Mrs. Lee ran our town’s orphanage. Babies were dropped at our doorstep or their mothers would come to give birth right at our dining table. And thus, my home never knew silence.

All of the babies in our orphanage never stayed long. None except me. I was the exception. They were all given back to their mothers as teetering infants or adopted by another family before they turned the age of five. I never had a chance to grow attached to the other children much. But my love was spent on Mrs. and Mr. Lee; they returned it with open arms. 

Our place was a shabby spot positioned out of the way from the town square. It had oddball characters in and out of it all throughout the day – pregnant women, new mothers, criminals, convicts, thieves. But it was my home, nonetheless. 

Mr. Lee worked and still works, I’m sure, as a blacksmith. His main job was making horseshoes, fixing broken wheels and spokes on carriages, and the occasional key-making when tasked. Mrs. Lee was the brains in our household. I wish I could say her husband was the brawn, but I won’t lie. Mrs. Lee, the matron, knew how to make money swiftly and easily in addition to the toddlers she raised. She would have keys made for the houses around our town and hire teens to invade the rich. Eventually, especially by the time I was born, the town mischiefs knew that if they mugged, stole, borrowed, or bartered with the people in the streets, Mr. Lee would give them an instant profit in coins. He would melt down anything of value: gold, silver, brass then resell them as brand new. The boys in town never quite pieced together that the Lees were making a ten-time profit off what he was given.

One afternoon, I couldn’t have been older than four, I was willingly taken into town; the hectic part near the square. It was nowhere near where I lived. At least as a four-year-old, I was convinced we were walking a long distance. A girl double my age led us to the center of the chaos. She was born at the orphanage and occasionally came back to say her greetings or collect much-needed money for her dad. Someone had been making an announcement sent by the high court. People gathered near to watch the spectacle; a few agreed with the changes, some spat at the feet of the messenger, and an infant’s handful were indifferent. She didn’t care for the changes which wouldn’t impact her for years to come. She did care for the bodies closely packed together. It allowed her subtle graze of a purse or ten to go unnoticed until it was too late for the victims to say a word of it. She went passing by, grabbing what she could, and forcing it inside her coat. Nobody noticed. This was my initial first-hand encounter with the thieving lifestyle. From that day onward, I learned how it all worked. I learned how to read people, to swindle people, and to never get caught. 

“Mrs. Lee, Nayeon and I just made the big bucks. There were so many purses in the town square that weren’t being coddled. I couldn’t help myself.” The girl with stringy hair pulled from her coat silver and gold coins of varying sizes, a gold ring, and a half bottle of perfume. She was complimented on her good work, but the Lees were disappointed that she had gotten away with coins. If a thief managed to get coins on their own, it was theirs. There wasn’t a way for Mr. Lee to get his hands on those for a higher profit. 

Whenever I would come home with a big score, Mrs. Lee would always claim my mother was looking down at me proudly. “She’s a natural,” men would laugh when I arrived with my pockets loaded with coins or silk handkerchiefs. Everything I touched turned to gold, quite literally. And the rare days when I was caught, my chubby cheeks, unique front teeth, and smooth-talking tongue helped me get out of it. 

At eleven, the farmers knew to hide their produce when I strolled through the markets. At twelve, I had stolen more pocket watches than I could count without using tally marks on paper. At thirteen… at thirteen… that was when I fell in love. My criminality didn’t stop, but her face made me question it often. If I were caught and locked away, it would mean my eyes weren’t able to gaze upon her beauty. And how would she think of me then? 

I was a small smart thirteen-year-old. I thought I knew all about love, in those days. One of millions who thought they knew everything about the world. Of course, I was wrong; I knew nothing. But as a kid, you believe you hold the world in the palm of your hand, and it’s your will to do the molding and sculpting. 

I guess I shall mention we never spoke, not one exchange of words. Not for years. It didn’t change the way I felt about her.

Her clothes were unlike mine, unlike anyone else in my town, unlike anything I had ever seen. My dresses and outfits all had the same drab color of brown or the occasional grey. What she wore were dazzling reds and blues and golds. Her hair was dark black and ended near her shoulders. She walked confidently but it was strange and indescribably cute. She seemed to know the town even if she were blindfolded. I was surprised I had never noticed her before. She was the greatest treasure I had set my eyes on. She was more special than a brass candlestick or a silver spoon or even a gold bar. 

It was the eve of the summer solstice when I saw her for the first time after a short-lived rainfall. I followed in her direction and when I noticed, I stopped myself. What was I, a common poor thief, supposed to say to a girl like her? Dispirited, I turned back towards my home. I told the various characters who stayed in the house I had witnessed a noble unlike any other. They told me I had to be having a heat flash or was going crazy. I believed them. 

That was until the weeks passed and I spotted her once again. This time she was carrying a satchel. It wasn’t a cheaply sewn material. It was a white piece of luxury that seemed so bright that it reflected the sun. I sized her up and pushed myself to talk to her. “Miss, you dropped your book.” 

She hadn’t. I swiped it while viewing everything else she carried in that purse of hers. Nothing valuable enough to brag home about. “You’re welcome. The name is Nayeon. Im Nayeon to be exact.” She took her book back without saying anything. She shuffled away while clutching her satchel as close to her side as she could. I couldn’t wipe the smile off my face.

I recognized the cover easily. We only had one bookshop in our town. The bookkeeper designed custom covers with intricate paintings and illustrations – which were massively overpriced. I was ‘banned’ from entering the store after a disastrous event of counterfeiting. Turns out forging wasn’t my forte nor was painting. Robbery was best and easiest for me. 

“No. Out. Out.” My foot hadn’t even met the floor of the shop when he caught sight of me. I rushed to speak, “A girl came in here before. She looks like nobility. She’s probably a lord’s daughter. Do you happen to know her name?”

“A lord’s daughter?” The shopkeeper laughed at my mistake. “Not even a close guess, Nayeon. She is Princess Myoui.” 

My foot finally met the ground and created a mini earthquake with the thud. The dirt and dust of the floorboards suffered the most and flowed into the open air before landing unpleasantly inside my lungs. It made me suffer a coughing fit before I could speak again, “Myoui? The four families, Myoui?” 

“Ahh, don’t you know our town is famous?” He whispered and motioned for me to come closer. “Don’t tell those convicts that make their way over to the Lees, but we house not one but two of the royal families in this uneventful place. The Minatozakis and Myouis love it here. Why? I have not come to the grand conclusion yet.” 

“In our town? Next, you’ll say the Sons vacation here. Or the Chous would even want to set foot in this country for that matter. Get some fresh air, yeah? I think the dusty books are making you think up fairy tales.”

“But it’s true-”

I stepped out from his shop and told myself not to see that kooky man again.  
I never mentioned the conversation to the Lee household. I didn’t want them thinking I had lost the plot twice because of the graceful girl in nobility.

Sometimes while I was out in the streets, I would see her again. If she were royalty like the shop owner said, I didn’t want to say anything wrong towards her. I would keep my distance. She was usually looking at flowers or crocheting on a bench when I saw her. I wasted my free time by trying to get her attention. 

I stole an orange once and offered it to her. She denied it then paid the poor farmer who hadn’t noticed.

I stole a book from the town’s bookstore. It was a lot prettier than the one she had read earlier. Again, she refused it and hurried to the shop. I can only assume paid him as well.

My last attempt was unsuccessful. I swindled a group of kids a few years younger than me with sleight of hand card tricks. All their pocket money for the week was mine. They ran back home whining. She had been watching me the whole time. I could feel her stare on me. When my eyes met hers, she turned away and went back in the direction she came. I sighed. 

One year would go by and I would have my birthday. She would catch my eye, but I still remained too fearful to approach her. Another year would go by and while eating a fancy birthday dinner by Mrs. Lee’s standards, I would tell myself I had to gain the confidence to say at least five words to her. Another year passed, and the sight of her made my cheeks flush. The fight or flight response in my heart always chose flight. The day after my seventeenth birthday, I was given a present from the fortunate powers that be, I believe. 

I was walking home from a successful raid of our town’s feudal lordship who had taken a weeklong vacation. The walk home featured a classy portrait of his wife which I sat in my wagon among other treasures and gold rings dazzling my fingers. I heard yelling that wasn’t too far off and took a slight detour. 

Four boys slightly older than me stood shouting curses and laughing amongst themselves. Usually, I left them alone to bully as they pleased, but I saw a glimpse of the white satchel – the one I could’ve pointed out of any crowd. I knew exactly who the owner was from staring at the material for years. Six daisies the size of a thumb had been stitched in the side. I had watched the path of flowers grow before my eyes from one year to the next. 

“I heard you’re related to one of the kings.” 

“Why are we in such poverty then?”

“Why are there no struggles for the monarchies, but us lowly people have to struggle?”

“How much money do you think we can get for ransom?” The boys all laughed but I had heard enough. 

I pushed my way through them, shiny stolen gold rings outfitting my fingers and all. “Leave her alone!” They laughed and cracked jokes about me now. 

“Is the town thief going to save you?” 

“The poor thief protecting the princess – the biggest thief of them all.”

“That feels like Déjà vu… or a simile… or…” 

“It’s ironic. It’s irony,” one of the boys deadpanned and it ruined their jolly mood.

“Well, I had to quit schooling to work at a kitchen to help feed my family. It’s not my fault.” 

“Is it irony, though, because we expect the poor beggar to save the damsel in distress?” Amidst their pondering silence and scholarly inquiry on the term ‘irony’, I managed to grab the royal girl’s hand and pull us to safety. When she was breathing calmer and out of sight of the terrorizing boys, she checked over her satchel and relaxed her shoulders. “Are you okay? Miss, Your Royal Highness ma’am. What may I call you?” 

She turned away from me as if I didn’t exist. She couldn’t even keep eye contact with me. I sighed like all those times before. She must have heard me as she turned back, “Princess Myoui, a pleasure to formally introduce myself, Im Nayeon.” I curtseyed and bowed and couldn’t seem to stop stuttering. Looking back, it must have been a bizarre show to her. I took a breath, “Your Royal Highness knows my name.” She gave me a smile and matched my bow which made me bow harder to show my respect. “You can call me Mina if you would like.” I shook my head once and stared at her deeply, “No? Can I really?” The princess nodded politely. I started, “Okay. Hi, Princess Myoui Mina ma’am. Um, hi.” She giggled a little and I’m certain my soul left my body on the paved streets, “Almost there. Next time we’ll have to drop the honorifics.” I was a stuttering mess, “Y-Yes, miss Mina ma’am. I meant – Mina.”

“Would you mind accompanying me home, just for today. I would be lying if I said that encounter hadn’t frightened me.” I turned my attention to my wagon full of jewels versus the most precious gem who had chosen that afternoon to speak to me. I indicated towards the stolen property, “Is it okay if I take those home first?” She allowed it. I partially dragged her in the direction of the Lee home, one of my hands encompassing hers, and the other pulling along the wagon.

“This is Prince-” When I almost introduced her formally, she nudged my arm. “Right. This is Mina. I’m sure you’ve seen her in town before, Mr. Lee.” He brushed the ashes from his drab outerwear and tipped his metal helmet in her direction, “I have. How do you do?” She self-consciously smiled at him, “I’m alright thank you. And you?” His attention was back on his work, leaving the air stale where he didn’t answer. “What are we supposed to do with a portrait?” Mrs. Lee searched through the items I had burgled. I could find a way to make any stolen good seem essential, “Hang it in my bedroom or sell it back to Lord Vrom since his late wife passed. I’m sure he’ll pay any price I ask of him.” Mrs. Lee tapped the oil-covered canvas with Lady Vrom as the centerpiece then nodded with pride. Mina was confused and her face showed it, “But won’t he have you arrested for that?” I grabbed a matchbox from the center table and struck a hissing match till it caught fire. I moved the light near the portrait as if to burn it, soon blowing on the flame when it neared my fingers, “Depends on how much he adores this painting. It’s always a gamble, but word spreads quick when someone desperately wants their property back in this town. And I’m happy to give it back – for a price.”

“Why do you do it?” Mina asked as it was her turn to drag me to her home, “Do you need the money that badly?” I hadn’t really thought about why I stole. I just did it. It was what everyone around me did. “Partially for the money. Partially for the thrill.” And partially because I want to show off. I wouldn’t tell her that. At least not yet. We were still strangers, then, by the dictionary’s definition – I was illiterate and had never seen a dictionary, but I was sure we were strangers. 

“Could you steal from anyone?” I already knew the answer well and would never change it. “Everyone gets desperate if you take what they cherish most.” Mina hugged her satchel to her side, “What would you steal from me?” I had already taken it. She only wasn’t aware. I held up a white pen covered in quartz. I wasn’t versed well enough to know if they were real or fake. “This and your bag. I would steal those first.” If only I could steal your heart, that would be the greatest heist. “Why my bag?” Mina asked it and it snapped me out of my lovesick daydream. “The daisies. There was only one, years ago before he was given a friend. Tell me, are you planning on making a whole garden on your bag there?” She decided not to answer. “I don’t know what they mean to you, but your bag is the item you value the most. You’d probably feel lost without it.” She looked devastatingly at the ground and shuffled her feet along. I noticed her try to kick a rock that bounced not too far off. There went my stuttering, “W- was I wrong? Did I say something bad?” She picked her head up and flashed me her best forced smile. “You were correct. If my bag goes missing, I’ll know to go straight to you.” She nudged me again with an apprehensive smile. I slipped her pen back without so much of a wink in detection. 

A little less than an hour later, and she had us stop our casual stroll before meeting a tall cobblestone wall riddled with rocks and designs etched at the top. Her house was hidden just beyond it. “Wait here. The guards already hate me for sneaking out nearly every day, they can’t see I’ve brought a friend.” She peered around the large concrete opening and breathed smoother. She told me there was only one and she wasn’t too worried. “Thanks for walking with me today. I know it’ll be a tiring hassle to get back.” She reached inside her satchel and pulled out three gold coins. Those could have fed my household for three months at the least. “It’s okay, I did it for you.” She attempted forcing the coins in my hand. My fists were balled up too tight. Mina started to grow frustrated. I found it cute. “I can read exactly what you’re thinking. You wear your heart on your sleeve, Mina.” Her eyebrows scrunched then relaxed, “Is that a bad thing?” I smirked and turned on my toes, “It just means you should watch out for pickpockets.” 

It took me twice as long to walk home without Mina by my side and when I sat at the table for supper, my back, feet, and shoulders ached. “Where have you been?” Mrs. Lee questioned while feeding the babies. “Mina had to get home safe-” She stopped moving and the baby she was holding began to whine and fuss, “Princess Myoui, Nayeon. The royals take it seriously even if she does not.” I didn’t think it was that harsh, “I’ll be careful.” Mrs. Lee forced a baby in my arms as I cradled him and soothed him to sleep. “Don’t lose your head over a royal you can never have.”

“Mina!” I hadn’t seen the princess for days. She turned to see where the voice was coming from. Her hair whipped around before her face followed. She was moving in slow motion in front of my eyes. She ran her fingers through her hair with a small smile when she realized it was me who had called her name. My eyes fluttered and I felt like floating away. Her eyes caught mine and my heart was aflame. She had a light pink hue on her cheeks. I decided I was seeing things as it faded away. I hadn’t heard violins or harps yet, but that was the soundtrack playing in my brain as she advanced closer to me. “Hi,” she spoke. Two letters. It only took two letters to forget what I was planning on saying to her, if I had anything planned at all. “Nayeon?” 

“Yeah, um, was your journey here better?” I managed to snap myself out of it, a blush was apparent on my face, I could feel it. Mina said nothing about it if she could tell. She responded clearly, “Yes. The boys from yesterday avoided me when I passed the shops. I think you might have scared them away for good. Thank you, again.” I shook my head fiercely and slapped my hand across her shoulder, “I didn’t scare anyone. I’m sure they’ll be back. I’d gladly walk with you in the evenings when you want.” She rubbed the sore area where I had hit her and grimaced. I took a step back in shame, “Sorry. It’s a habit.” Mina brushed it off like it never happened and clasped her hand in mine. “I need new sewing fabrics. Walk with me?” I instantly said yes. There was no way in hell I’d ever say no to spending time with her. 

She didn’t ask me to, but when she started in the direction of her home, I continued walking alongside her. And then again when she had come into town two days later. She never asked to be escorted home; I would still happily follow. The one downside was Mina still offering me money each time we were outside her fenced area that stood before her home. I refused. 

It went on like this for a time. We would talk as friends do, sometimes speaking too fast our tongues were tied on a topic and other times walking in peaceful silence shoulder to shoulder. Occasionally she would grab my hand to hold her own. I always liked those times the best. I wouldn’t extend my hand unless she did it first. My palms would grow sweaty and I willed them to stop. They never did. 

Then winter came. She didn’t come to town often during the winter months. That winter felt colder and darker without her smile. The days that the sun peeked out from the clouds for a limited number of hours, she would appear as well. It was like she brought the sun with her. I’m sure she could make those short winter days brighter for anyone by simply breathing. “Mina!” I was happy to yell it anytime I saw her. She would smile shyly and walk to meet me.

I can’t remember when it was or how long we had been friends. I heard her soft voice as I watched a new aristocrat couple who had moved into our town. They would be knowing of me shortly. “What do you think it’s like?” she asked a little louder than before. “Being rich? You tell me.” She grabbed my arm and pointed in a direction a little far off. “No. That.” My eyes trailed her arm then her pointer finger then finally landed on a couple barely hidden in the shadows. I quickly pulled her hand down. Even if she was a princess, people didn’t generally like being pointed at. “Holding hands? We do it all the time, see?” I held up the hand she held intertwined with mine to remind her. She shook her head. 

“That.” The taller of the two put their lips to their mistress. I gulped starkly and let go of Mina’s hand without intending to. “Oh, that,” I repeated, unsure of why my voice sounded so foreign. She watched the profile of my face curiously while waiting for an answer. The couple broke apart after the brief encounter of their lips meeting. They had sauntered away before Mina or I could say anything. “Have you really never kissed before?” I waited for her to speak. Her face showed the response before she said ‘no.’ Like always, I was used to reading her pretty expressions and knowing what they meant. My confidence in the kissing matter was false. I had never done anything such as that. My cheeks grew rosy with just the thought of the word. She changed the subject to ask what my next thieving heist would be. She didn’t revisit the topic after that day. Not for the longest. Neither did I. 

It was never the same after that. And yet, nothing had changed. But the air was different. I had noticed it, had no way of knowing if Mina had. Her hair had grown long by the years passing since I first saw her. She frequently brushed the stray bangs from her eyes. I could catch her in the corner of my eye, brushing them irritatingly from her forehead. I mention this because I would also catch her eyes on my face. Staring, but choosing not to mutter a word into the silence. Her gaze started to impale me with how strong it became. I never understood if she hated my face or if I had something strange in my teeth from my breakfast. She never said what she was thinking, then. And that was one of the few times I struggled reading her face. 

“What was it like?” she asked as we made our way to her home one afternoon. “What?” I questioned. She stopped on the side of the trail and picked a growing pink flower. She plucked its innocent petals, “…the kiss.” I didn’t know how to respond well, not confidently, “Oh, that.” Her eyes waited expectantly. “It’s hard to describe, I think.” I had no idea if it was. I had no way of knowing at all. She threw the harmless flower to the ground, only stem and nothing else. 

Time passed again without her mentioning it. The trees bare of leaves began to bud, the leaves growing healthy and strong, then turning orange and brown before our eyes. It wasn’t until the last leaf had fallen did the conversation come up again. “Would you do it? For me to know how it feels. Would you-” She never liked speaking the words that I knew she meant. It seemed her mouth couldn’t articulate them, and neither could mine. My cheeks ran from a pale white to peach to pink and finally settling a broad red color. It felt like I had been transported back to the first time we spoke. My speech uncertain, stuttering, not knowing what to say. Eventually, my mind was free enough from haze to agree. The air was changed again. This time in anticipation instead of apprehension. 

She tells me one day that she is ready. I nod, not sure if I am, but she will not know that. Near the halfway point between her house and the town, I stop us both. I instruct her to close her eyes. She does perfectly, waiting. I’m nervous. Too nervous that I feel my heart in my throat. I tell her I will count down from three. She waits. I grip her shoulders and wonder if this is the love that people feel – the love that people describe as if they cherish it. It primarily reminds me of a summer day that is too hot to breathe, to see, to feel, to sweat, too hot to move. And yet, I do. I do all of those things all at once, all without thinking. I let out a breath from the same lips that would be upon hers shortly. Mina felt it upon her face and shivered. My voice was coarse, “3” my mind blank, “2” my eyes compactly closed, “1”. I felt her puckered lips press against mine and at once felt them go numb. They were soft, the most prized silk I had ever felt. It was hard to know where her lips ended and mine began. We breathed as one, we sighed as one, we broke apart as one. But when I looked at her face to read her expression, it was blank. Her face was unchanged from before the kiss. She was unreadable.

I would like to tell you a tale of us walking back and forth into town after that day while her hand kept attached to mine. I would like to tell you that we became one of those couples who sneaked pecks in the shadows. I would like to say that she forgot that she was royalty and I a thief, and we broke the class structure to shambles. I, unfortunately, cannot say any of that. 

She sent me away instead. 

Not by her guards taking me in the night while I slept because of our affair. Not by running and confessing my years of burglary. No, she simply asked me. All she had to do was ask. 

It was one of the last days of walking her home. “Would you do a favor for me if I asked?” I told her I would. “I have a friend who lives nearby – in a castle or palace I don’t know exactly. You handle royalty the best, however, and I need to know if she’s well.” I listened as she spoke. The Minatozaki girl she hadn’t seen since childhood. She told me of her being quite simple and mad. She wanted to know she had not gone absolutely insane while living in that house. She had a plan, she told me, just to know her royal friend was alright. 

And a plan she had devised well. I was to become Sana’s handmaiden. I was to live with her and take care of her well. I was to help Mina deliver their letters back and forth. I did it. I did it for Mina. Her approval or her love, I’m not sure. 

I wish I could say she was the villain of the story. But there are no villains. None I have chosen to describe in great detail. 

In exchange for what I promised her – the deliverance of letters and the welfare checks of a royal princess – she found ways to sneak me onto her property and to her room. Some nights she let me sleep there – on the floor, of course, atop a mat, but there was no complaining from my part. Her handmaiden ignored me when she delivered Mina’s food. I was sure she hated me. Mina told me to ignore her. 

“Her whole family is crazy. Her father, the king, had his heirs killed. Her aunt mumbles to herself from day to night, I witnessed it myself. Her uncle is talked as if he is worst of them all. And she, Sana, has a few missing screws from living around her cracked family members. You are to help her,” Mina whispered to me one night before we both lay down to rest, “And in exchange, you shall have anything in that house that you like. Anything that will make you a fortune is already yours. Take what the household cherishes most as long as she is safe.” I agreed to the terms with no hesitation. 

My first task was a simple one. I was to mail a letter written by Mina but as if she were her mother. She wrote that I had been a good handmaiden to her, yet she no longer needed my services as she would be touring the kingdom with her husband, leaving limited room for her many servants. She claimed to have sent the letter to many households hoping for someone to take me in. Both Mina and I knew that only one house had that option. 

A week later, a response came. They were to have me. They addressed that Sana’s previous maid had run off and become pregnant by the stable boy and were in desperate need of my services at the earliest convenience. The next morning, I stood before the ivy-ridden palace that was to be my home for an indefinite amount of time. A letter written by Mina for Sana had been placed nicely inside my luggage that I held tightly in my grasp. I had no way of knowing exactly what it said but she described it to me as I was leaving. 

Before I left Mina’s bedroom for the last time, she pressed her lips to mine. It was different than any of the kisses from the past. Normally, Mina was cautious. This time she seemed to lose all her inhibition. When I was leaving was when she wanted me to stay more. I would pull away and she pulled us back together. She did that until she had to let go and I had to leave. “I- take care of her. Take care of Sana.” She moved an abandoned strand behind my ear. I felt a tingle near my ear even as her fingers left their place. Mina closed her eyes and wrapped my arms around her waist. “And take care of yourself.” I tried laughing, “I’m going down the street, Mina. I walk longer to get to town.” She sighed and kissed me again. She wasn’t sure I would understand it could’ve been my last time seeing her for a multitude of reasons. 

I readied my fist to knock against the oak door. A woman in a white apron propped open the door before I had the chance. “I am to be the new handmaiden,” I spoke confidently. She observed my clothing, which I had borrowed from Mina, then told me I would do. She made me get inside as quickly as possible. “It’s almost winter out there. You will catch a cold and cool the house if you keep standing out there.” Slippers were replaced on my feet as my shoes were put away. She guided me up the stairs, “These are the servant’s stairs. You are used to being the handmaiden for the Myoui household so I suspect you know your duties. You are to wake Princess Minatozaki, bring her meals, bathe her, clothe her, and when the watch hand hits here,” she indicated the arms of the watch positioned in a reversed ‘L’ shape, “she is made to meet her uncle in his parlor to be his secretary, orator, and cataloger.” She showed me other times: lunch, dinner, the princess’ readings, then she handed me a pocket watch with gold trimming. 

She thought nothing strange of it; simply indicated that I needed it. It was something I would have scouted for days to collect if I were still in town, but here, in this dark house which seemed like a foreign land, I was handed one like it was a piece of cheap parchment paper. 

I was shown the rooms of the house hastily. It was not nearly enough time to memorize. Finally, she settled at the final two rooms. Sliding doors with painted cherry blossoms were closed off, not a gap of light shining through. The other door simple with not so much of a splash of color. “This is the lady’s quarters. She is asleep now as you have come so early in the day. You will have an opportunity to speak once breakfast is served. This will be where you sleep. She has terrible dreams, you know, and likes for her handmaiden to be by her side at once.” I nodded at this information and slid the door that was to be my own. It was only a bed; no room for anything else. I bowed to the head servant as she left to attend to her own work. 

Mina had taught me what it meant to be a handmaiden from the time she told me her plan until the time I left, but I was still uncertain. I waited, while unpacking my suitcase, for the sun to rise and to witness the second princess of my lifetime. She called out to me when the grey sky turned clear. She spoke of another girl’s name. I didn’t know whether to blame it on her forgetting or the madness that ran through her blood. I rushed in the room accompanied by the letter. I bowed and presented it when the time was right. 

“Mina has sent this?” I stared at the floorboards carefully, “Princess Myoui, yes ma’am.” She read it over, struggled with her forehead while complaining of a headache, and asked me if I could read it. The letters written were a secret code I had yet to crack. The only words I could make out then were ‘the.’ She told me it was alright for that moment; however, she would need me to read soon. She stated she was to be my teacher over time. How much time? I didn’t know. My heart still yearned to be as close as possible to Mina, so time moved slower at the Minatozaki palace the servants and maids titled as Zetsubō. 

She stood, walked closer. I gulped at the intimidating gaze and her hypnotizing beauty. Are the nobles drinking a different type of water? They must be. She observed me so harshly, I believed she would spit on me or worse so slap me. Her voice was delicate instead, “You can curse at me or steal things from me. But please don’t lie to me. Understand?” I understood well.

Even when the sun rose high, the house was still dark and cold. Sana seemed used to it as I stole glances to check on her as Mina had instructed. Nothing seemed amiss with her. She only seemed lonely. She didn’t like to each breakfast alone and after a few bites requested I eat with her. I undressed her from her nightgown, wiped her smooth skin with a warm damp cloth, and outfitted her in a fashionable one-piece. She told me she didn’t understand why it had so many designs if she wasn’t to see any guests. I deduced the only guests she had were her uncle’s. When I would learn more of her routine, I memorized they would come once a week and she was to stray from Zetsubō alone even less than that. She reminded me she had to see her uncle, as if on schedule, and I checked the watch hidden away in the pockets of my borrowed gown. I walked with her to her uncle’s parlor she called a ‘library’. I tried walking her all the way. The strange man with tinted glasses yelled. Sana quietly told me I wasn’t to step a foot near the books. In her uncle’s eyes, a servant’s simple glance could ruin them. 

I waited for hours inside her bedroom before I was to fetch her. I took inventory of the room. I had no idea what she desired most – that took getting to know a person. But I could sense the most expensive items she hoarded alone inside the house. A buzz ran through me at the thought of getting away with royal goods. Items the king of my own land kept close. But I didn’t think it possible still. It felt like a trick. 

I escorted her at lunch after redressing her. I didn’t see her again until night fell and she had to change for dinner. After the hours of my solitary lonesome passed, she came to bed with a yawn. She told me when it grew warmer, we were able to walk the river. She said it with a shudder which I ignored. At night, we parted ways. Me to my bedroom and she to her own. Her voice came ringing in my sleep, though, waking me with a start. She told me of the terrible nightmares she regularly had. She requested I stay by her side through the night. If she were to have another nightmare, my calming face would reassure her enough to go to bed. She had done this with every handmaiden prior and none had said any different. I slept with no problems near her. I heard her sigh next to my ear as she drifted off. She was close enough that her hair tickled my cheek.

I learned her routine in two days’ time. The time she spent gone for hours was when I snuck to Mina’s. It may seem dumb to sneak from princess house to princess house with their guards outside making sure to keep people out. And it was dumb. But I learned fairly quickly that that’s what love does. It makes you dumb in all the wrong moments. I still didn’t get caught. I’m Im Nayeon, but I had close encounters occasionally. 

Sana was waiting in her room at one of those encounters, and I guess I will say I was caught. She sat with her legs crossed, waiting for my return. She immediately grabbed hold of my face close to hers and looked it over. I passed the note Mina had provided me with once she let go. “Why are your lips swollen?” her question was hard and rough. “Why are your cheeks blushed?” My face showed my lack of a reply. “Do you love her? Mina?” I stifled my laughter to buy myself time, “No. Not at all… ma’am.” 

“The first lie I will forgive. Any more won’t be excused.” Her lips were tight and stern, “That’s my wife you’re kissing.”


	3. PART THREE: Free

Free

Since Mina and Nayeon have told part of their story, I suspect it’s time to tell mine. You know me already. Fragments of me as a child from Mina. Our meetings were brief and only a wink in my life as a whole, but she told it well. And then there’s Nayeon. The pretty girl who comes to live with me who doesn’t know me too well at all. 

To start at the beginning is to describe my lineage, my birth, my wicked family known for being strange. First, there was my grandad. We never had the chance to meet. He died before I was born or maybe after. Servants come up with all sorts of stories when they’re bored, and his children never talked about it. Not with me. He had two sons and one daughter. The first-born son, my dad, was in line for the throne. His other son was a terror to everyone even as a child. I’ve heard it all in passing, it’s hard to know what to believe. They’ve said he bit the maids, poisoned chauffeurs, locked his sister in an ice chest before she could walk, tried stabbing his mother at the dinner table not once, but twice. I don’t know what was real. Suffice to say, he didn’t get anything in my grandfather’s will and lost his chance at the crown if anything were to happen to my dad. He hated his relatives because of it.

The sons were raised differently. My dad was trained politically on how to act as a leader and negotiator. His brother was taught to stay out of the way. The daughter stayed by her mother’s side and when the king and queen both grew sick from a plague, she stuck by them until the end. 

Then there is my mother She was the daughter of a wealthy lord and with slight persuasion and capital, she was able to marry into the royal blood of the Minatozakis. That is how marriage mostly went in our world. A royal married into another royal family or had the choice to marry a well-off noble – one considered neither royalty nor a commoner. Any marriage other than that was looked down upon. This is how it worked for the men. The women born under nobility were arranged to marry. Their views on love weren’t important. Women didn’t get a choice.

But my mother and my dad are said to have had a sweet marriage. He became a duke and she a duchess. She was pregnant with her first child – me – at the same time my grandfather grew sick. My dad became king the same year I was born. Some servants mention it was even the same month, I’m not too sure. They had hoped I would be a boy. My parents' hope was gone along with their chance to have another child. My arrival in this world was also the same year, the same month, same day my mother died. I am said to be the one to kill her, indirectly. Fate had given me the label of murderess before my umbilical cord was cut. My dad wanted me to meet the same fate as she. I had committed treason, high treason at that, against the crown, so why must I live? that was his reasoning. I think sentencing me to treason would have been a better outcome than how I lived. Treason or never being born at all. 

My aunt was the one to save me. At times, I wished she never bothered. She promised to look after me when she heard of my father’s wrath. She took me from the Minatozaki Castle to live with her and her brother. Years later, my dad would come back to this palace, kneel before me, and apologize for what he was prepared to do. But my life story gets better before it gets worse, see. 

I was to live with my aunt and uncle from an infant. The house was hidden away and not many knew it to be the king’s property. Generations prior, it housed the king’s companions or illegitimate children – of which, I wasn’t too far off. My dad made his brother and sister live there. He wanted to keep them hidden from society’s judging eyes. 

My earliest memories of my aunt were from when I was five. She would whisper me stories until I fell asleep in a bed too big for my body. She was a good parent. Yes, she was crazy at the end. But she wasn’t always. Most people aren’t. She taught me to sing, to dance, to read, to sew – I never used that skill much. When I was nine, she started to lose herself. She stopped wanting to teach me to read and write, complaining it was a useless skill. After reading my first word, I grew hungry for more. I would read book after book. That hunger was turned against me. I should have listened to her.

At ten, I found Mina in her garden. She was the only friend I had made excluding the company that was paid for inside the palace. She had curious eyes and a kind heart. I married her because I liked her and also because I didn’t want anyone else to have the chance. For her or for me, it didn’t matter; we were destined to be together. That story has already been told and my perspective doesn’t differ much. But the night after the boat ride is where everything changed for me. That was when I lost my aunt. The only person to care for me.

That’s where my uncle enters as the main character of my life. It was more like my main antagonist. He was the villain everyone painted him to be. If it wasn’t for him, my aunt would still be alive. He didn’t harm her, not physically. But emotionally her damages couldn’t be fixed with a bandage. He made her crazy. He could have made me too if I stayed long enough.

Her life had been too hard, so she became one with the river. My uncle didn’t care. He had planned to marry her for the inheritance she earned from her father. Now he planned to marry me, the one who had been written in my father’s and aunt’s wills. Everything was to go to me except the crown. The guardianship of me was awarded to my uncle as I had no one else. The day after my aunt was gone, I was made to work in his library. I would work day and night until I turned eighteen, then I would be married and fully be his property. Only one other person knew. And they were set on helping me. As a ten-year-old, I was unofficially engaged to him, but here’s the trick – I had already put a wedding band on another person’s finger. If only that could have deterred him.

When my aunt ‘ran away’ – my uncle’s words – the servants didn’t allow me to step foot outside for a year on my uncle’s orders. Meaning I never saw Mina again after those days. We still communicated when we could. An origami crane filled with words in a mailbox here. A letter written on a wrapper thrown over the hedges there. But there were no more face to face interactions for us. 

Mina and I were kids and had no actual belief we were or would ever get married. Dreaming never hurts. It was much better than living my reality.

Thus, we are fast-forwarded to the days of Nayeon arriving at my doorstep and bowing down to me as my handmaiden. Here and now she stood motionless, staring uncomfortably at the ground. My words had just been, “That’s my wife you’re kissing.” I had tried to make my voice more controlled. Even if she would have denied it, I had seen her. I had seen them both. 

My uncle had dismissed me early for the day and complained of ailments in his neck. I shut the book with the scantily clad images throughout and lifted it to his shelf. I was careful not to damage them, he cared for them more than me, more than himself. With no handmaiden to escort me back to my rooms that afternoon, I snuck to a room my uncle didn’t know about or had forgotten. My dad had built it for his sister. It was barren but had windows that brought the sun to all areas of the space, every corner, something that wasn’t normal for the palace as ‘sunlight ruined books’ in my uncle’s eyes. 

Only I had the key when my aunt passed away, and you would have never guessed one of the windows had a view of the Myoui residence. Our houses were too far apart, however. I could never see much besides shadows at night. But I chuckled to myself at the sight of Nayeon, my supposed handmaiden, leaning on a ledge. Her lips meeting Mina’s whose face was hanging from her bedroom window. Mina laughed as Nayeon almost fell back, then their lips were together again. Nayeon had a white envelope in her hand it seemed. A letter for me, I assumed. She didn’t care for the letter at all. Both her and Mina were too focused on kissing comfortably without running the risk of letting Nayeon fall. She pulled away. Mina didn’t want her to leave. It was cute if I was anything near a romantic. A real Romeo and Juliet couple before my very eyes. Mina had Nayeon’s hand tightly clutched with hers. She mumbled something I couldn’t see. Nayeon kissed her once more before jumping down. She returned, letter in hand. Rosy cheeks and swollen lips. 

Nayeon hadn’t said anything and was unmoving. “Since you lied once, we shall begin your schooling lessons. I will read my letter while you write along with me.” I sat her down in a chair near me once her movements had unpaused themselves. I wrote her name plainly in my best font. ‘Im Nayeon’ followed by my own ‘Minatozaki Sana.’ I was sure writing those names would be a task itself. Then I debated for a brief moment. I wrote ‘Myoui Mina’ underneath mine. “I want you to try to write those letters as I’ve done. Ask me if you need help.” She traced the names I had written. Beside them, she tried her own. I watched her carefully before turning my attention to the letter Mina had sent. 

_To Sana,_  
_From what you have written in your letter, I believe Nayeon has met your acquaintance well. Like I have said previously, we need her to deliver these letters. We cannot be caught and discovered for your safety. We leave in less than three months. That is when you will be able to leave that house behind, and me, to leave Nayeon. I understand time is happening sooner than we imagined._  
_Signed your wife (teehee), Mina_

I was made to throw the letters in the fire. Mina knew I could never do that. I kept them all in a lock box under my bed. I drafted a letter back to Mina and would wait a few days before having Nayeon deliver it. 

Nayeon’s eyebrows were scrunched in harsh concentration as her hands were stuck on the letter ‘z’ in my name. I moved to help. My view from behind her chair helped me see better. I grasped her hand with mine softly, just grazing the skin of her pale backhand. Her eyes gazed upwards into mine as she let me. Her head I forced back to look at the paper. Her skin was soft, it was reminiscent of my velvet throw covering my bed. My middle finger unconsciously ran across her knuckles when I eased my hold. 

“It’s easier to write if you grip the pen towards the bottom.” Her letters and words seemed jumbled from holding the writing tool in the middle. I still held her hand and gently moved it closer to the pen’s point. She was watching me again. My breathing was staggered as she looked at me. Her hands were warm. They felt like heaters I wished to cuddle against on that cold wintry day. She wasn’t writing anything, but my hand didn’t want to let go. She dropped the pen. It made it easier for me to intertwine my fingers with hers and she let me with no hesitation. I leaned closer to her neck, not knowing exactly what I was doing. My ears heard a gulp, and a pounding of a heart, it could’ve been hers or mine, possibly both. “There’s a million ways to grip a pen. That was only one,” I didn’t even know I had spoken it. Nayeon moved her thumb over mine so faintly I barely felt it; barely. I tried letting go but she pulled me by the wrist. “Wait, show me.” I shook my head, “It’s almost time for supper. Help me get changed?” It was a question. I, a royal princess, was asking a thief turned handmaiden a question. I shook my head again and waited to be presented with my dinner gown. 

That night like nights before, she slept beside me, I closed my eyes and exhaled deeply every few seconds. I pretended to be in a deep trance until her body was relaxed. I stared silently, almost too scared to breathe as it could ruin my study of her features. Her delicate cheeks, her rounded chin, even while asleep her lips were plump and alluring. My imagination filled with mine pressed to hers. I could see why Mina – I stopped my thoughts there. I shut my eyes tight, turned my body away, and willed myself to sleep. There was no reason I should fall for Nayeon. It was a shame I already had. 

My nightmares didn’t stop because she was near me. There were more than five handmaidens who stayed with me since I can remember, and my night terrors never went away. With Nayeon there, I suppose the fear of having one subsided. I fell asleep with ease next to her. I had a terrible nightmare that night. It was one where I was forced to marry my uncle and he never let me leave. Never let me see the sun. Never let me do anything except read books. I tried leaving through the windows, but they were shut tight. The doors were all locked. I began to claw my way out through the walls, my nails getting filed down to nothing, and when there was no nail left, I didn’t stop, couldn’t stop. I had to get out of there. I screamed. The servants all ignored my cries. The paint on the wall would get filled with red then reappear as newly unchanged drab grey walls. I screamed again. That was when my eyes opened. A soft touch was on my arm, but I was still in that house with the grey walls. My nightmare wasn’t ending even though I had woken. “Hey, hey. You’re okay. Just calm down.” I couldn’t calm down. I thrashed in the bed. The gentle touch seized my arms and crossed them over my stomach. “Sana, calm down.” Sana? Who was calling me Sana? I was let go. I continued writhing and wiggling in all different directions. A cold glass was put to my lips. I was lifted up and told to drink. Two gulps went down before I flung the cup away, it made a shattering sound somewhere far off. “Sana, look at me. Focus on me.” 

My voice was still groggy as I tried to stop thrashing and tried focusing, “…Nayeon?” She nodded once before presenting me with her smile. “Yes, now just breathe, Sana. Look at me and breathe.” I listened. I don’t know how long it took to calm me down, but she did it. She laid me back against the bed. I didn’t want another nightmare. I didn’t want a nightmare ever again. “Hold on to me? Please don’t let me go, Nayeon.” She wrapped her body around me like she was glued to me. “I have you. You’re okay, Sana.” We shared my pillow and I turned my face towards hers before my eyes closed. Her breath was warm, similar to mine. Our foreheads were nearly pressed together. “Maybe I could be content here if you were with me.” She lightly caressed the bridge of my nose until I fell asleep in her arms. 

She was cleaning the broken glass when I had risen for breakfast. She smiled from the corner of the room while she mopped up the water with a towel. I beckoned her closer, “Come eat with me. You can do that later.” She sat with me and used a butter knife to spread jam on our toast. Before putting the bread to my mouth, I hesitated. Nayeon saw me. “Eat,” she told me tenderly. I put the bread down. “Would you run away from here?” I waited for her answer. I would have waited as long as it took. “This town? Where would I go? This is all I know.” Her tone was sad but still joking, always joking. “Would you run away with Mina if she knew where to go?” She stared at her bread, decided it didn’t have enough jam, “If she asked, yes.” I put my food down. “And if I asked?” She didn’t say anything. Her mouth continued to chew the bread. In the excruciating silence of perhaps twelve seconds, I gave up wanting to know. “I’ll have a bath this afternoon after my first reading. Someone will bring a tub to my room.” My appetite was gone, and I dressed myself for the day. “Work on your writing while I’m with my uncle,” I said when we parted ways outside the library.

Everything was prepared when I found myself back in the room. Nayeon rolled up her sleeves but told me to wait because the water was too hot. She dunked her hand in and nodded once it was cool enough. The entire time she stared off blankly. I tried talking to her but was given one-word answers without barely a movement in her facial expressions. In the spare time that followed my bath, I tried teaching her to read two and three-letter words. She was mostly unresponsive. “Where would we go?” I had been trying to get her to read the word hat, she didn’t care for it much. “The Chous are supposed to have awe-inspiring beaches,” I threw the book out of sight, needing her to be closer to me. She stayed put. “The beach…” she was in a daydream until my fingers met hers. 

I started to fake my nightmares at night. When I did have them, I acted as if they were worse. Nayeon’s fingertips would trace my chin and hum to calm me. If I awoke with no nightmares, I would return the favor to her delicate face. She never told me if she knew, that wouldn’t matter to me anyway. She started easing into reading more. That was all we talked about. That or Mina.

“Do all royalty know each other? Have you known Mina forever?” Nayeon was plaiting my hair in two French braids. I laughed, “No, we met in my backyard. We weren’t permitted to talk.” Nayeon concentrated on my hair then replied again. “And then you were married?” I nodded proudly, “Mina will never tell you this, but I was the one to propose.” Her hands paused. She sighed deeply, “What if I were to want – A commoner would never be able to marry royalty, would they?” I reached behind my head to feel her. She moved around to stand in front of me. Her eyes were on the ground. “Nayeon, look at me.” Her gaze didn’t change. “Nayeon, look me in the eyes.” Her head slowly lifted. I stood, moving closer to her. “Do you know what the most important thing in Mina’s life is? Do you know what she desires most?” She studied my eyes before her face relaxed back to the floor. She muttered her answer, “You.” I shook my head; she didn’t see it. I tilted her head back up from her chin. Our stares didn’t waver. I held one of her hands and let the other drop, “Mina and I are complicated, but she loves you.” She began to shake her head in denial, but I steadied it, “Ah, of course, a diamond doesn’t know she’s a diamond if she’s told she’s carbon all her life… and even so, you unwisely think of yourself as graphite when you’re anything but. You’re special to both of us, Im Nayeon.”

I moved her hand to the top of my chest. My heart felt as if it could break free. She could feel my heightened pulse. She scowled but didn’t move, “You’re lying. That’s why your heart’s beating so fast.” My stare drifted to her lips then to her hand pressed as close as possible to my heart. “It beats for you because I’m telling the truth.” Her eyebrows wrinkled together, “Sana, I-” I didn’t want to hear her response if it was bad. I refused to hear it. “I think I love you,” it felt like it fell from the sky instead of murmured from my lips, this declaration of my love. I put my lips to hers. She never pulled away. 

“My uncle’s guests are having a day trip to hear me read. You should go see Mina and hand over a letter I’ve written.” She willingly put her lips to mine, her hands roamed my neck down to the base bone that connected the neck to the shoulders. “You are still okay with…?” she didn’t finish talking as I kissed the side of her face, below her sideburns, her chin. “Mina would never forgive me if I kept you two apart neither would you. I love you, but she’s the one that has your heart.” She stayed silent, confirming what I already knew. I made her show me card tricks while describing what Mina looked like as the years had passed without me seeing her. She lit up when speaking of her.

I hated my uncle when I was ten and I hated my uncle to that very day. I didn’t talk about it with Nayeon or Mina, maybe I should have. I was expecting Nayeon to come back with a bright smile to brighten my day. I was expecting her eyes to by shining and shimmering and dazzling like every other time she had seen Mina. But they were shining from the water pooled in them. She flung the letter sent by Mina on my desk and paced the room back and forth. I watched her as patiently as possible. Her fists were clenched and there didn’t seem a moment when she would loosen them. “She’s getting married.” She rushed out while still pacing. “Mina is what?” 

“They’re arranging her a marriage. She’s getting married.” 

The tears were threatening to fall, but she was being strong. My brain was working ten times faster than usual. I stopped Nayeon from pacing. “Let’s take a walk,” I said. Her entire body was trembling, “How can I take a walk when she-” I understandingly nodded, “Look at me. It’s okay, okay?” She began pacing again, “She will get married and have to move from here. She’ll have to move in with her husband. I’ll never see her again.” I sat on my bed and watched her for a while. She needed to process it more than I did. “You can talk to me. I love her too.” That made her pause and look at me. “I thought we had more time,” was all she whispered. “I did too.” 

I read the letter. _It’s now or never, love._ Mina’s writing had been unstable and rushed. I sighed. I threw that letter in the fire. The only one that burned to ashes. “Do you need space?” I was seated in my chair against my desk as I asked Nayeon. She shook her head, “I need you.” I closed the distance between us and wrapped my arms around her, our bodies pressed together. “You love her too?” Nayeon’s voice was strained and stammering. “I do.” 

“Could you leave your parents?” Nayeon’s head was watching the ceiling as if it would change. “I’m an orphan. I could leave the Lees if I had to.” Her hand brushed purposelessly into my hair, her gaze never wavering from the ceiling. “I have no one left in this world except you and Mina. Everyone else-” She tried lulling me to sleep softly, “We’re here now. And that family you deserved, I’m sure they’re watching over you.” 

“We need to visit the river tomorrow.” She didn’t reply. She knew which river and why.

I kicked a rock then another slightly larger one. The rushing of the water was familiar to me, but it seemed more calm than usual. Nayeon was holding my hand while following behind me. She was scared of it, I think; as if the river could suck both of us up and reduce us to nothing. I walked against the riverbank, Nayeon switched hands to walk by my side as far away from the water as she could be. I couldn’t move my feet anymore, the memories of her circled my mind. “You can wait here if the water is too-” She held onto my hand tighter, her palm was sweaty, “No, I’ll go.” I kissed her once. My legs followed until they hit the edge where land meets water. 

I addressed the grey waves and the uncertain flow of water. I always thought my aunt became one with the river after, “I’ve missed you. For a long time, I hated that you left me here with him. But now I think I get it. I have Mina, you met her a few times. And I have Nayeon, you never met, but you would have liked her, she would have made you laugh. You didn’t have anyone to depend on. I’m lucky I do. So, this is our final goodbye.” Nayeon scrunched her eyebrows, “What do you mean?” I threw a pebble in the rushing river, “Everything I touch turns to ash.” She was still confused. “Well, that’s alright. Everything I touch turns to gold,” her smile lifted my mood. And maybe she was right. “Make me golden, Nayeon. Runaway with me.” She turned in the direction of Mina’s house then turned back, “…okay…?”

“We leave tonight.” 

“What about Mina?” Nayeon questioned while we packed bags. I closed my eyes with a quiet sigh. “Can I tell you something about how much she loves you?” She waited. I took it as a yes. “When Mina was sixteen, she heard that my uncle was planning on marrying me once I turned eighteen. I think she heard it from her dad to keep the notion that we were a family of crazies. She decided to leave with me when we turned seventeen. But she met you. She chose not to leave yet. Mina always used to write about you. About the cute girl from afar or the heroic Nayeon who saved her from a huddle of boys. The girl who used to steal for her. She even wrote poetry about you. Mina wrote so colorfully about you in her letters that I ended up falling in love with you too before we even had a chance to meet. Can you imagine? And then meeting you in person was better than words could describe, I understood her. She postponed us running away for a while, for you. She knew she rarely saw you in the cold months. She didn’t want to go another winter without you, so she made up this fiction about you needed to make sure I was alright. But we had found ways to send letters. And she knew I was doing okay.” Nayeon stopped moving. “She did all this for you? For me?” I sat and patted the cushion next to me, “Mina’s dad was chosen to be king recently. The council decided it. It’s why her proposal was so rushed. Mina will get married. She’ll live in a palace or the king’s castle. She’ll be taken care of with no uncertainties. Everything will be catered for her. They’ll want her to have a male heir or ten. And it might be a good thing.” Nayeon shook her head in disbelief, “No.” I touched her shoulder, “It’s the way of life for us. We don’t have a choice. The next ruler of this land has to be her son.” Nayeon stood, almost falling over, “No. You talk leaving this place, you’re not allowed to do that. Not without her. What ABOUT MINA?” 

“We’ll have to leave her.” She grabbed a coat and some boots, maybe a hat too. It all happened too fast for me to notice everything. “Then why did you tell me? Why did you say she loved me? How dare you act like you cared all this time for me or for her. Why would you say anything if we’re just supposed to leave her?” She left my bedroom door wide open. I didn’t go after her.

I knew she had gone to Mina’s. I debated watching them from the bright windowed room. I decided against it. I was already asking a lot. Asking Nayeon to leave Mina, asking her to be okay with that, asking her to choose me instead. I wasn’t going to intrude on their privacy on top of everything. Maybe things would have been better if she were never involved. Maybe Mina and I could have run, never looked back. She would have resented me for leaving Nayeon. Now she would resent me for taking her. 

Nayeon came back even more irritated. She looked at me like I was a stranger. “She won’t talk to me. She didn’t know we were leaving without her. She said she thought she was breaking my heart by getting married. She thought she was breaking yours. But it was hers she should have kept guarded.” Nayeon flinched like she had been struck across the face. “She said-” Nayeon saw the look in my eyes. I’m sure it seemed a wounded puppy had taken my spot. “She said she’s glad her dad had yours killed, but hates she ever pitied you. Maybe I hate that I pitied you too. You’re too selfish to garner people’s sympathies.” She stopped, her facial expressions faded, “I don’t want to leave with you tonight.” My mind replayed two thoughts only: Mina hates me, Nayeon is repulsed by me. “Then stay! Mina will leave you. I will have already left.” Nayeon furiously unpacked the bags she had prepared earlier, “Poor Sana and her pity party. Her awful family. No one has a perfect family! Everyone has nightmares!” I gripped her arms, “Who asked for your pity? I assure you I never asked for hers. I’m glad she has to get married and have baby after baby, so she’ll never have you.” Nayeon wriggled and twisted herself free of my hold. “I hate she made me come here. I hate I ever saw you as anything except a lunatic,” Nayeon let out in a mild whisper. I let her go with the softest scoff. She didn’t move to leave. I didn’t know why. She was free to leave if she hated it here. I, on the other hand, would never have that option. “Mrs. Lee warned me I would lose my head fooling around with royalty. She never mentioned my heart,” Nayeon was searching for something, maybe a reason to stay. She was free to go. Her words had already stung enough. 

“It’s your fault that Mina is mad at me, but it’s your uncle’s fault that we plan to leave in the first place,” she stole a letter opener from my desk and rushed out the door. “Nayeon, where are you going?” I followed behind her. “Nayeon.” Her ears were deaf to my cries. She took the path that she escorted me to every day. It led her to my uncle’s library. “I can’t hurt him without consequences, but I will hurt the books he cares about most,” she halted her feet outside the door. She had never stepped foot inside. She took a deep breath before being careless. I followed her, remaining silent. She opened the first book she had grabbed from the shelf. She stabbed at it with the silver letter opener before throwing it across the floor. It made a sharp tinged sound until it skated under a bookshelf. She started ripping page after page. I still said nothing. 

Her hand paused on a page I won’t describe in great detail. It was a drawing of an intimate man and woman. She looked at me like I was a wounded puppy once again. “What is this? What are these books, Sana?” Then she moved to another book and another and another. Each one having similar images that stopped her from ripping the pages. “This is what you were reading every day? He was forcing you to read it to him? He was forcing you to read it to his friends?” All I could do was nod as she tore more books to shreds. “This is what he forced your aunt to do day after day? Read this filth to him?” She flung a book across the room and knocked others down in the process. I nodded again. Nayeon moved on from shelf to shelf ripping through books. 

She wasn’t done it seemed, but she held my face in her hands. “Sana, you-” Her eyes shut tight as she was thinking on the words to say. “Are you sure Mina will be taken care of? In some large castle with too many servants to name and too much money to spend.” Again, I nodded. Words seemed to have left my brain. Her fingers massaged my earlobes and I found myself calmer than ever. My eyes matched her closed ones in uninterrupted silence. “Okay, we leave tonight,” Nayeon said while letting me go. She continued to rip book after book. “Let’s run away together like you said.” She told me to go back to the room and repack. 

“What was Mina’s genius plan? Start from the beginning,” Nayeon had soundlessly found her way back. My heart was surprised as she put her lips to the space behind my ear. Her arms caressed my body, “I saw you quivering when I walked in. I know you’re scared. We can do this together. I don’t want you living anywhere near him anymore.” 

I unlocked my box that held my letters. Two written passports were hidden inside under all other papers and trinkets. “She had these fraudulent ones made for us to get out of here. The names aren’t perfect, but they’ll do.” She gripped the papers. She tried her hardest but forgot she couldn’t read. “I’m sure they look good enough. I’ve never seen one in real life to judge.” I reached under my bed for a box, “Open this.” Nayeon hesitantly waited. I encouraged her to go ahead. She lifted the lid and was shocked by the bills that lay in the box. “Where? How do you have this much money?” I stared at her. She put her palm to her face, “You two are royalty, right.” I closed it and shifted it back under the bed for the present. “Now, we just need to tell the stable boy we’ll need a coach. A ferry leaves every day at 6, 8, and 10 in the morning. I think we should catch the six o’clock.” She turned to head to the stables. “Not that stable boy,” my words stopped her. “Keep the pocket watch on you. I know you could point out everything of value in this place. Choose what we’ll eventually have to sell off if the marriage doesn’t work.” Nayeon was already stealing what her hands had been itching to take, “Marriage?” I pecked her lips until she smiled, “We’re getting married. Are you ready to be my wife, Im Nayeon? Sorry I don’t have time for a daisy-fashioned wedding ring like with Mina.” Marriage was the only way for me to get my inheritance. I checked the time, “I have to go eat dinner. Have everything ready for us.” 

She escorted me to my uncle’s dining room for the final time. I couldn’t focus the entire time. My uncle was upset by my stumbling of words. My mumbling that night made him shake with fury. “Glove!” One of the chefs who served him handed him a black leather glove. He smacked it against his palm once, twice. It didn’t matter. His steps were heard from the other end of the hall where he sat at the head of the table. With no hesitation, standing in his place, too close for comfort, he smacked the glove harshly against my cheek. I smiled. He was disgusted. I had been disgusted all my life until I had a way out. Another smack and I burst out laughing at the table. No one would have grasped how great freedom felt for me. When I was released back to my resting rooms, time rushed too quickly for me to comprehend. The bags were near the door. Most of the money had been hidden away in the bags or Nayeon’s pockets. She handed me enough bills in case we were separated. We didn’t mention Mina again, then. I’m sure we would have dragged our feet about leaving if we had. 

The coach was waiting in the cold stables. The previous stable boy who had fallen for my old handmaiden would be the driver. Nayeon took one final glance towards the hedges she used to get to Mina’s house, then loaded our bags in the coach. I told her we were leaving immediately when in reality we stayed in the stables until dawn. As much as Nayeon wouldn’t believe me, I hated leaving Mina. She had heard from Nayeon that we were leaving, so if she wanted to join us, she would have plenty of time. 

“Why are we not moving?” The sound of grasshoppers clouded my hearing. It wasn’t enough to block out Nayeon’s voice. “Not yet. Everyone in the house needs to go to bed.” She grabbed my hand, her fingers traced every line, every crack, every dip. “You can sleep when you’re tired,” I spoke it but Nayeon shook her head. “I’m not tired,” she yawned but covered her mouth. My singing voice aided her rest. I had taken the watch from her before she slept. One hour passed. The grasshoppers continued their music. A second hour. My lips pressed to her forehead. I wished it all could have been different. Mina would show. She would. A third. Nayeon groaned at the discomfort of sleeping in such a tight space. I tried to soothe her back to sleep as well as she always did every night. It wasn’t the same when I did it. The fourth hour. I told the driver to get from the house but not too far. We ended outside Mina’s. A ten-minute walk away. I still had hope she would show somehow. She would knock on the window and be annoyed we thought of leaving without her but relieved she didn’t have to walk far. A fifth hour. Nayeon had woken. She said she was a little hungry. I had pocketed a roll from dinner. She tried sharing it with me. I told her to have it all. The sixth hour passed. “Read me some of Mina’s poetry,” Nayeon requested. I told her I would later when we were safe on the boat. A seventh hour. The stable boy was heard, “It’s an hour before the ferry, Princess Minatozaki. I believe it’s best if we leave now.” I checked the time for the millionth time, “One more minute, please.” Nayeon felt the same as me. She undid the curtains on the window to find Mina’s house one last time. I think she would have given anything to see her running to meet us with a bag over her shoulder. She sighed but tried smiling for me, “Can we come back later? Can we see her again?” I waited for the horses to begin their trot. “I hope so.” Nayeon rested her head on my shoulder, “And we can do this without her?” 

“We’ll stumble and fall, but we can do this without her if we’re together.” 

I was finally free but not without a cost.

I was sure I was seeing a ghost. 

“Mina?” 

Nayeon didn’t hear me, she was busy unloading the carriage with the help of our driver. The bottom of Mina’s gown was clouded in mud. She had a plaid blue and red shawl covering her shoulders. She was exactly what Nayeon described. 

I pushed Nayeon to get her attention. She almost tumbled before looking up. “Nayeon, do you see her too? Maybe I am starting to lose it already. Do you see her?” 

Nayeon didn’t say anything, didn’t move; her voice was puzzled when she eventually did. “Sana?” she said through gritted teeth. I was sure I was seeing things. The crazy in my genes was setting in. I had her pinch me but still saw Mina in front of us. “Nayeon?” 

The wind was too wild to keep her hair in one place. She was still beautiful; always beautiful. She was smiling and walking closer elegantly. Her appearance was everything I had dreamed up. 

“You two!” she was pointing angrily in our direction. It didn’t make me want to hug her any less. “Mina!” my arms were opened wide. Her anger still bubbled on the surface, “I felt betrayed when you planned on leaving me behind. I was angry. You, Nayeon, took what I cared about most in this world and you, Sana, did the same. But I would rather be angry with the ones I love than without.” 

My arms found their way embracing her body. She melted into me and a smile replaced her frown, “I think there’s a wedding I couldn’t have missed, Duchess Minatozaki.” She let me go to see Nayeon, “I never told you I loved you in all those years. I’ll start changing that. Do you want to become a duchess?” Nayeon looked confusedly at me then back to Mina. Mina looked at her then me with a nod. 

“Marrying two princesses? How’d you get so lucky?” I waited for her reply and Nayeon smirked. 

“If it’s what you both want, I’m not stopping until you two are queens.” 

**“Ten minutes until departure.”**

We walked arm in arm in our journey to freedom. Nayeon rested her head on Mina’s shoulder, “So, I hear you wrote poetry about me.”

“I was like fourteen!” 

“That just makes me want to hear it more.” 

I felt relaxed near them, “Oh, it’s even better than what you’re thinking.”

I felt at home.

“Sana, you’ve been giving away my secrets for free?” Mina faked being upset. 

“Ahh, I should be charging, right?” I puckered my lips for hers to meet mine. She pushed me away, “Later, Duchess Minatozaki of Loveavail.”


End file.
